Teach Pedantry!

I think pedantry should be taught in school, all day and every day as a complement to all the other subjects. I can't think of a better way of motivating children than encouraging them to outsmart their teachers. Every schoolroom would have a tall stool on which the teacher found guilty of errors would sit, with a dunce's cap, for five minutes per mistake. Just think what it would do for the quality of teaching! Of those who survived the first day, that is!

Hmmm. I don't think clever kids really need any encouragement (or special equipment, for that matter) to humiliate their teachers: I have to cringe sometimes when I remember how we treated some of ours. We certainly didn't let them get away with spelling mistakes on the blackboard or minus signs that came out wrong. Kids have no sense of when to stop in that kind of situation.
Try reading Stalky and co. some time and imagining what it might be like from the teacher's point of view...

>1 CliffordDorset:

This does speak to a theme some outstanding teachers try to urge upon their more timid colleagues: Let go of some of your own authority and give more authority, hence responsibility, to your students. This can indeed be alarming, and incompetent teachers will be the last to consent to it. But if we mean what we say about teaching critical thinking skills and motivating students to become lifelong learners, then we teachers had better show our work, including our mistakes.

Students' default position is often that making a mistake is an indicator of incapacity. A successful class is one in which making mistakes and receiving demerits for them is not the end of the process, but the beginning and middle.

It doesn't help that students are encouraged to think of intellect as a kind of magic that, like the kids at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, you're either born with or you're not. It doesn't help that they are so often exposed to pop-culture stereotypes of "geniuses" who figure things out by flawless intuition, through the magic of super-intellect — not just the needs of the screenwriters for a fast-moving plot.

In reality, of course, geniuses make a lot of mistakes, which they then learn from. It's the "learning from" that's too often missing in conventional education.

Not that I would pin the blame on teachers, who are often denied enough authority to allow for sharing any with their students. Sometimes I'm not sure that we really want, as a society, to raise a lot of critical thinkers. Think about it: That would make it much harder to stimulate consumer demand, to finance consumer purchases at exorbitant profits, or to predict voting patterns. People at the top would have to work a lot harder to stay there.

Peasants, running on fears and premonitions, are much easier to handle than informed, self-confident citizens.

3 >

There is a strain of conspiracy theorists who speculate that the reason for the increased regimentation and dumbing down of public education in the last few decades is a direct reaction to the 1960s, when The Powers That Be saw what happened when you had an emerging educated population that questioned conventional wisdom and pushed boundaries.

On the other hand, I really do know someone who was at Woodstock but became an insurance company executive. So, no guarantees, I guess.

As it is Pedants' Corner I must bring up a subject that was brought to my attention by one of the denizens of this group, namely the use of the word "Theory" when "Hypothesis" is what is really meant. Of course, this means the well known phrase "conspiracy theorists" does not mean what people use it to mean.

>5 pgmcc:

We're in a world in which 'academic' is taken to mean 'trivial', even pointless, so what price theory/hypothesis!

#6 It is infuriating to her the street preacher outside my office talking over his loudspeaker saying, "Evolution is only a theory".

I do not think he realises he is saying, "Evolution is only 'the only hypothesis supported by all the available data'".

While I agree with the substance of your complaint, I must offer what I hope will be taken as a Friendly Amendment to its syntax, since this is, after all, the Pedants' Corner. I was hoping for a slightly expanded sentence, with an adverbial "so" and a consequent Result Clause, e.g. "It is so infuriating . . . that I am tempted to go outside and give him the choice of my hitting him up-side the head with his own G-d loudspeaker, or repairing to the local beer-joint for a short tutorial on The Way It Really Is." Being essentially a Person of Peace, I hope you choose the latter. Keep us posted.

#8 I am of a peaceful frame of mind myself, so, much as I would love to go outside and lodge his loudspeaker where it would do most good, I refrain from that course of action and avail of the services offered by a website entitled, "simplynoise(dot)com". It has a very useful white noise generator that enables me to carry on working while ignoring the tripe in the street. It works well for buskers and preachers alike.

Point of information: Friendly Amendments to syntax always accepted in the spirit in which they are proffered.

As a pedant you will appreciate this point of information can mean different things in different circumstances.

;)

>2 thorold:. Well I remember our English teacher struggling to teach us under-tens spelling. I boldly told her “You have (rhymed with cave) to be out of your mind (rhymed with wind)”. She, quite rightly, banned me from the English class for the rest of the term. How I wish I could go back in time and apologise to her.

wind or wind?

11> Exactly, binders. :) What chance did those poor teachers face? They must have got the wind-up because of the wind-up.. .. .. .. ..

Rough, dough, bough,...

I was shocked to notice today that the New Oxford American Dictionary that comes with my computer has this as the pronunciation of
'mind' - "mind |mɪnd|"
cf.
'wind' - noun |wɪnd| 1 the perceptible natural movement of the air
and
"wind" - 2 |wʌɪnd| 1 intrans. move in or take a twisting or spiral course

Hmm. A bit ghotiy, if you ask me.
The OED has Brit. /mʌɪnd/ , U.S. /maɪnd/ for mind.

I was just listening to Science Friday, and the presenter (not Ira) pronounced 'primer' as primmer.
I'm not a native speaker, but it sounded odd to me. Is this some regional pronunciation or are there situations that call for that form?

#16

That would sound odd to me.

As a native speaker of North American English (Chicago-born), and having travelled and worked all over the USA, I can tell you I've always heard "primer" pronounced to rhyme with "glimmer". The other pronunciation of the word is limited to ignition/accelerating agents in explosive situation, e.g. engine-starting, older firearms, etc.

I have never heard "primmer" as the pronunciation of "primer". I would find it most peculiar.

Is it similar to pronouncing Finance as 'feenance'?
It seems to be an American thing, and sounds very strange to me.

I suppose it IS an American thing. Still, of all the peculiar exports of American culture, it seems fairly innocuous, certainly better than, say, "impact" as a transitive verb -- an atrocity which now occurs regularly on the once incorruptible BBC World Service.

I've never heard "primer" sound like 'primmer" until I began listening to NPR, and most likely it was also SciFri that introduced the pronunciation to me. It seemed very odd, but it's not like I've had much opportunity to use the word in my daily life in Florida, so I assumed that it was one that I learned from reading and had always pronounced it wrong.

I've always lived in the US - California, New York, Florida and now Minnesota. I've never heard "primer" spoken as "primmer."

ETA: Checked with my husband who was brought up in the Northeast. He said the same.

Where in the heck do you ever hear that word? We're talking about school books, right? The only time I can remember hearing it is on shows like Little House on the Prairie in which case they pronounced it primmer.

Got to say I'm with Mr. McDonald on this one. It's always been "primmer" for me.

Interesting that no pedant so far has asked >16 JerryMmm: jerryMmm what context the word primer was used in.

As in “apply three coats of primer...?” (sounds like old “timer”)

or

“She was primmer.” As in more prim...?

26> I didn't ask because I assumed I heard the same program recently! If so, they were talking about "primer" as in introductory level information about the topic.

I've only ever heard paint primer pronounced with the /ʌɪ/ vowel.

Both mean the same. “Preparing for the next application.”

If it is as in "introductory level information about the topic," I've always heard it as "primmer" rhymes with "dimmer." For paint, it's "prime-er" rhymes with "dime-er."

Chicago born and bred (and educated).

Perhaps paperback primers, as opposed to paint primer, make you more prim.

>30 binders: So, binders, it would appear you have to decide.. :o)

Are you binders as in book-binders or binders rhyming with cinders..? Your chance to be pedantic and prim on PEDANT SCORNER..{):O)

It was indeed in the context of an introduction to something. I can't recall the exact segment of SciFri, it was in the past 3 weeks, possibly in the baseball postseason prediction topic, or one close to it.

In Dutch the paint you put on before you put on the top coat is also called primer, as in 'prime-er'.
I've only ever thought about pronouncing it as prime-er. It seems all to come from the same root. A first thing before a further thing.

>32 Novak: as in book-binders of course. I'm australian and diphthongs are our second favourite kind of thong.

I don't recall ever hearing anyone say "primmer" (except when they meant "more prim"), but primer isn't exactly a word you hear every day. The OED seems to be saying that both pronunciations exist in both US and British use, with "primmer" being the more common of the two in the US and the less common in Britain. For paint, welding wire, etc., only the diphthong pronunciation is given.

Apparently in New Zealand they use "primer" for the lower classes of a primary school (what used to be called "infants" in Britain) and always pronounce it "primmer"; my Shorter also claims that Primer in typography is pronounced "primmer", but the full OED simply says that it's obsolete.

34> I'm australian and diphthongs are our second favourite kind of thong.

Same in UK. The BBC's "Thongs of Praise" is so popular here, always takes first place :)

As I said, you're not likely to hear that word, at least in the US, unless you're watching Little House on the Prairie.

School books these days are called textbooks, which is almost an oxymoron. Do you really need to distinguish from picture books at the school level?

whatever happened to Baby Jane?

38> I don't know? What's the connection to this thread?

39> Laugh.. .. .. .. I was trying out the theory of finding a member by placing their name in a message after . Worked too. Then I forgot to delete it. Doh......